Category — Endorsement Deals

“M.J. was introduced as the greatest player ever and he’s still standing there trying to settle scores,” one Hall of Famer said privately

In the lead-up to and in the wake of Michael Jordan’s big Hall of Fame induction weekend and the (disturbingly petty) speech he gave during it, Nike has been pushing these “Leroy Smith” viral videos. Question is, Who is Leroy Smith?
Check it, Savvyites:[Read more →]

TAG Heuer recently ran an ad campaign for their Monaco brand watch. It was a contest to guess the winner of the above “Duel” between two important figures in the history of the Monaco series, Steve McQueen and Lewis Hamilton. The contest officially closed on June 10th, 2009. Apparently, it’s been one of TAG Heuer’s most popular online contests ever.

According to TAG Heuer, Lewis Hamilton won the Duel… but I don’t think anyone wins with this ad. They sliced up the original footage from the Steve McQueen 1971 film Le Mans to shoehorn his image into the ad, and then used a poor quality voice actor that sounds nothing like him to dub over his lines. Ironically though, McQueen’s shoehorn/voiced over performance is better than Lewis Hamilton’s actual performance. And McQueen’s been dead for almost 30 years. Overall, the ad is fairly lame on that level. Still, it has racing footage, so I can’t call it all bad. Check out the full version:[Read more →]

It looks like Kellogg will be ending its endorsement deal with giant torso and Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps after a picture of him smoking a bong have surfaced in the UK tabloid News of the World. Phelps admitted to smoking weed and apologized for his “regrettable” behavior and “bad judgment”, and blamed it on youthful indiscretion. This really won’t put a dent in his income though, since he still on board with a load of major sponsors like Visa and Speedo.

Still, Kellogg said Phelps’s actions are “not consistent with the image of Kellogg.” So they’re not renewing his contract when it expires at the end of February. The thing is, I’m happy about it. Now, don’t take that the wrong way, I’m 100% for the legalization of marijuana. The “war on drugs” is the reason the United States has the highest population of prison inmates in the entire world. The US has 5% of the world’s population, and nearly 25% of it’s prisoners. It’s not just per capita either; the US actually has 2.3 million criminals in it’s prisons, more than any other country; all because of the “war on drugs”. So I don’t care that Phelps smoked some weed, that means nothing to me. I’m happy he’s off Kellogg cereal boxes because he’s a freaking douche. Read on for my rationale:[Read more →]